In a recently released report, “National Strategy for Trusted Identities in Cyberspace” [PDF], the White House proposes the creation of a voluntary system in which citizens, government agencies, and businesses could register, permitting the secure provision of multiple services and commercial transactions. From the executive summary:

In the current online environment, individuals are asked to maintain dozens of different usernames and passwords, one for each website with which they interact The complexity of this approach is a burden to individuals, and it encourages behavior—like the reuse of passwords—that makes online fraud and identity theft easier At the same

While Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) and cloud computing are all the rage these days, one of basic tenets of SaaS – the pay-as-you-go, subscription-based pricing model – seems to be catching on in the traditional desktop software world.

Last week Adobe made waves by announcing $35/month subscription pricing for its flagship Photoshop product, which has traditionally retailed for over $1,000. Another giant in the traditional software market, Microsoft, has long offered subscription-based pricing for Microsoft Office, but is now also looking to bring Office to a hosted subscription-based offering via Office 365.

This shift isn’t entirely surprising – subscription-based pricing offers . . . [more]

I’m just back from a great ABA TECHSHOW in Chicago last week. I learned lots about legal technology and enjoyed the company of fellow technology enthusiasts. Wish you all were there, but as I know many SLAW readers were not, in lieu I offer a great collection of articles from the just released 2011 Techshow Tips issue of Law Practice magazine:

• Tablet Users Face Off: iPad versus Slate Shootout
• A Day in the Life of an iPad Lawyer
• A Look Inside the New Mac Apps Store
• Must-Have iPhone Apps
• 10 Tips for Getting Started with Open Source Software
• Google

The features on professional networking site LinkedIn change frequently, so it is worth spending some time periodically to update your profile.

Earlier this month I attended the AIIP (Association of Independent Information Professionals) annual conference. I took a bit of extra time to attend one of the pre-conference workshops put on by Scott Brown, owner of Social Information Group, on using LinkedIn. It was good to have a current, detailed look at the network and its current features.

Allow me to share a few things I learned:

• some of the formatting options are hidden under unrelated sections in

Public Safety Canada released an information paper, Social Media / Webmail / Smartphones: Networking with Risk,

The purpose of this Information Note is to raise awareness of some threats and vulnerabilities that have recently affected users of various social networking sites, webmail services and smartphones. These widely used communication technologies have taken on a significant role not only for individuals, but also for organizational communications and outreach initiatives. This document is aimed at providing organizations with an overview of some of the risks that are associated with using these technologies with the intent of promoting the use of applicable

In late 2008 I proposed that eventually someone would use a legal blog post as an authority in their factum. Here’s to one step closer to that goal.

I just noticed that a blog post of mine on Slaw about Ron Livingston was cited in an article by Rebecca Phillips in the Fall 2010 issue of the Campbell Law Review, Constitutional Protection for Nonmedia Defendants: Should There be a Distinction Between You and Larry King?

Phillips discusses statements made by social media users used in defamation cases and its conflict with First Amendment rights. In her conclusion she mentions . . . [more]

On April 19 the new BlackBerry PlayBook will hit the shelves at 20,000 stores and couriers will be busy delivering the pre-orders. Thanks to my old technology friend John Olah (He had a great contact at RIM!), I had the opportunity to spend some time with a pre-release version of the PlayBook at ABA TECHSHOW this week. I was generally impressed with this device, but have some hesitations as well.

The PlayBook felt very solid in my hand. It is 1cm thick and the rubberized back and sides let you keep a good grip on it. I always feel I . . . [more]

Standards for on-premise, cloud and mobile technologies used by lawyers have, to-date, been lacking. While an abundance of recommendations, best practices and other guidelines have been issues by Bar Associations and other organizations, there has not been a single, comprehensive document lawyers could look to for clear guidance on what minimal standards should be adhered for on-premise, cloud and mobile technologies.

The International Legal Technology Standards Organization (ILTSO) aims to change that. ILTSO is a non-profit organization consisting of attorneys, bar association representatives, IT professionals, and business leaders with a stated mission of “helping attorneys and clients better understand the . . . [more]

The good folk over at 3 Geeks and a Law Blog have asked readers to contribute Your Favorite PowerPoint Story:

We had a lot of traffic, comments and feedback when Toby wrote his “Don’t Use PowerPoint” post last week. We thought we’d play off of that post to ask the readers to comment on some of their PowerPoint stories (we said they could be good or bad… but, we preferred bad) and share them with us for this week’s Elephant Post. I’ve used PowerPoint for many, many years, and it is a rare occasion that everything that worked on

LAWPRO has seen a significant increase in bad cheque frauds targeting lawyers all over North American over the last two months, and over the last week several new names are being used on the ongoing collaborative agreement frauds. We are also seeing more activity in the last few weeks on frauds involving a real estate purchase deposit and a settlement of an employment related personal injury claim. Over the last few months several hundred lawyers from across North American have reported to us that they received various versions of these messages attempting these frauds. See below for more details on . . . [more]

Last week TechCrunch featured a terrific guest post by Mark Suster about Why Startups Need to Blog (and what to talk about …). In reading Suster’s blog post, it occurred to me that many of his recommendations for startups apply equally well to law firms.

The kinds of questions I constantly hear from lawyers about blogging – “what should I blog about?”; “who is my audience?”; “where should I post?”; etc. – are the same kinds of questions many startup company bloggers-to-be ask about blogging. Suster’s article provides insights that bloggers from any industry can benefit from.

A few . . . [more]

Technical work in the library–largely done behind-the-scenes–is key to ensuring things go smoothly on the client-facing side such as reference and research. One tedious and time-consuming tech task is shelf-reading: checking each book on the shelf to ensure it has been signed back in and is in the correct place. Without doing this on a regular basis (such as once or twice a year), books that have been mis-shelved become impossible to locate.

A library shelf-reading prototype using augmented reality technology–technology that adds to an image of physical space with a computer-generated overlay–is being developed out of Miami University’s Augmented . . . [more]